Arrest warrant against Prabhakar in funds scam

New Delhi: Indian police said on Monday it would go all out to track down former India cricket star Manoj Prabhakar, who is apparently on the run after being linked to a financial scam. An Indian court had issued a non-bailable warrant against Prabhakar in the funds scam in the northern Indian hill state of Uttaranchal. The state police had alerted counterparts in the Indian capital New Delhi, where Prabhakar lives, to arrest the former all-rounder. "We are still waiting for a formal reply from Delhi police regarding the warrant against Manoj Prabhakar," Uttaranchal's Director General Of Police Ashok Kant Sharan told a news agency. "In case he is not arrested, then we would declare him a proclaimed offender." Sharan also said the property assets of Prabhakar, who headed a defunct finance company in Uttaranchal, would be frozen if he failed to surrender before the court. The scam involved investors who were duped of their money after investing in a savings scheme run by Prabhakar's finance firm. Officials from the Delhi Police said they would arrest the former Test all-rounder on sight. "The Uttaranchal police has asked us to execute the non-bailable warrant which means we find the accused, take him into custody and hand him back to the relevent authorities," a senior Crime Branch official said. "But to the best of our knowledge Prabhakar is in Jaipur (city)," he said. The official, who was involved in investigations into a huge match-fixing scandal involving former South African skipper Hansie Cronje, said police in Jaipur had also been asked to track down Prabhakar in the northern city. Prabhakar blew the whistle on match-fixing in Indian cricket but was then named himself as a culprit in a report by federal detectives, leading to a five-year ban by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI). The former international alleges he is being persecuted by the authorities for blowing the lid on the scandal in 1997, implicating many cricket stars and high- level officials.